


Braid

by womeninthesequel



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/F, Female James Potter, Friends to Lovers, Hogwarts Seventh Year, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-30
Updated: 2020-11-30
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:47:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27791758
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/womeninthesequel/pseuds/womeninthesequel
Summary: "Can I braid your hair?"Jamie blinks. Once. Twice. Three times, just to be sure.“What?”
Relationships: James Potter/Lily Evans Potter
Comments: 28
Kudos: 56
Collections: Fem! Jily





	Braid

**Author's Note:**

  * For [alrightginger](https://archiveofourown.org/users/alrightginger/gifts), [theroomofreq](https://archiveofourown.org/users/theroomofreq/gifts).



> Thank you to @theroomofreq for the prompt! It was exactly what I needed.
> 
> For @alrightginger, who makes everything better. I love you, Marcy.

"Can I braid your hair?" 

Jamie blinks. Once. Twice. Three times, just to be sure.

“What?”

“Can I braid your hair?” Lily asks again. 

Her finger marks a place on the page in front of her, but she isn’t looking at the book. Lily’s green gaze is solidly on Jamie, making her feel a little too warm for her jumper. 

“You don’t -” Jamie starts, tugging on her collar. “I mean, don’t feel like you have to -”

“Is it getting in the way? You keep tucking it behind your ear.”

The warmth moves from Jamie’s chest to the back of her neck. She resists the urge to rub it like she often does when she starts to get nervous. Not many things make Jamie nervous, but Lily is certainly one of them. 

“It’s all right, Evans,” she mumbles.

“I know it’s all right, but I can fix it. Here.” Lily gets up from her seat and, in another motion Jamie can’t quite believe, pushes herself up so she is sitting on the table. She twists to face Jamie and makes an impatient spinning motion with her pointer finger. “Turn around.”

Jamie Potter can do many things. She can throw a quaffle almost anywhere on the far end of the pitch and make a goal. She can plan game strategies and Transfiguration theory in her head at the same time. 

But she can’t disobey Lily Evans when she says something like that.

With no other warning, Lily’s fingers are in her hair in an instant, gently brushing through the small snags. When she’s satisfied, she sweeps it into a low ponytail, holds it for a few seconds with one hand, and then starts to separate it into three sections. 

Jamie has to swallow to keep herself from saying anything too embarrassing.

Maybe it’s better that she doesn’t say anything at all.

What is she supposed to do when the girl she’s been a little in love with since third year is running her fingers through her hair?

“You looked a little distracted,” Lily says once she’s started to braid. Her fingers brush against the top of Jamie’s ears. “Maybe I can help.”

Can she feel the way Jamie is blushing?

“We’re studying,” Jamie says, looking down at her hands. They shake slightly, so she presses them together. “I’m bound to get distracted.”

Lily hums an unconvinced response. 

“What’s distracting you, Jamie Potter?”

Jamie has studied Lily Evans long enough to know when she’s smiling. Through the years, she’s been able to catalog the many moods of Lily. Jamie doesn’t have to see her face to know what expression she has. The tone is enough to hold important clues. If she turned around, Jamie knows she would see Lily with that secretive little smile that’s almost a smirk. 

Plenty of other people wouldn’t even know she’s capable of it, but Jamie has caught it several times. It’s the smile-smirk she has when she thinks her own joke is funny. The one she tries to hide when she doesn’t want to admit that Sirius almost made her laugh. 

The one she uses when she’s teasing Mary on the couch in the common room.

Wait.

Is Lily Evans teasing her?

“What do you think, Evans?”

The space between Jamie’s reply and Lily’s answer might only be a second, but time stands still for Jamie. Years of stolen glances and building their friendship hang in front of her.

Did she misread? Has she spent so long waiting for any sign from Lily that she jumped too soon? Has she put away the most insufferable parts of herself, the parts she has tried to change for the better, just to bring them back out at the worst time?

Lily Evans couldn’t have been teasing her.

She’s made up the whole thing. Jamie should write this off as a joke and go back to what they were. She can be Lily’s friend. She can study with her and laugh with her and -

Lily’s fingers move from Jamie’s hair to her chin. A feather could knock Jamie over if that feather was named Lily Evans, so it doesn’t take much pressure to make her turn her head. Lily’s gaze meets hers again, and Jamie worries that she’s forgotten how to breathe.

Even if Lily Evans never teases her, if something goes horribly wrong and they never speak again, Jamie Potter doesn’t think she’s ever going to get over Lily Evans.

“You’re very distracting,” Lily whispers. 

In that instant, Jamie loses any ability to make sense of her thoughts.

They become even more scrambled, which Jamie wouldn’t have thought possible until now, when Lily bends to kiss her.

The feel of Lily’s mouth on hers, a little hesitant under the courage it must have taken to act, is enough to restart her brain. 

Jamie reaches for her. 

She isn’t sure this is real, but she’s not going to waste a moment of it. Lily’s hair is soft as it slides between her fingers. She tastes like the minty toothpaste she always leaves on the sink in the girls’ dormitory and smells like sweet vanilla. 

Jamie’s senses are all _Lily, Lily, Lily,_ but she doesn’t try to shove it away this time.

Lily makes a quiet moan against Jamie’s lips that goes straight to a new warmth that is building below her stomach. She turns to move fully onto the table, her hands abandoning the back of Jamie’s head to thread through the hair behind her ears. Their movements work together, tugging them closer when they both open their mouths at the same time to deepen the kiss.

The moan turns into a gasp that might be the best thing Jamie’s ever heard. 

Lily moves her knees onto the table, forgoing any library rules about climbing on the furniture. The thought crosses Jamie’s mind that she could put her hands on either side of Lily and pull her into her lap. So easily, she could...

A book skids across the table and lands on the floor with a muffled thud.

That brings them both back to reality.

Their heavy breathing is the only thing Jamie can hear when they pull away. The world is red hair and green eyes and everything Lily Evans. Her heart and thoughts are racing, rushing past _Is this really happening_ to _I need to do that again_.

Jamie and Lily keep their eyes fixed on each other, noting the changes from the past few minutes. Not much time has passed, but everything is different. Lily’s lips are red, and Jamie finds it nearly impossible to keep her gaze from straying to them. When Lily’s hands drop from Jamie, her hair hangs by her neck, the braid undone. 

“You’re, um,” Jamie tries. She clears her throat. “You’re pretty distracting yourself, Evans,” 

Honestly, she’s impressed with her own ability to string together a sentence.

“Yeah?” 

“Yeah,” Jamie confirms.

The smirk-smile comes back. Jamie’s pulse races, and that’s it. She’s absolutely never going to get over Lily Evans. 

“Maybe we should move our studying to the dormitory?”

The heat inside Jamie sparks into a fire. Catching Lily’s hand in hers, she helps her find her footing on the ground again. Jamie can feel herself grinning but can’t do anything to stop it. 

She doesn’t want to do anything to stop it.

“All right, Evans,” Jamie says. “Let’s study.”

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on Tumblr @women-inthe-sequel!


End file.
